High salt effect on RNA synthesis in Krebs ascites tumor cells

Effects of osmotic shocks on the ultrastructure of different tissues and cell types

This study deals with the effects of hyper- and hypo-osmotic media on the ultrastructure of four different types of cells and tissues: rat pheochromocytoma cells of line PC12, mouse Ehrlich ascites tumor cells, rat kidney cortex and intestine. Application of hyper-osmotic conditions induces in the nuclear compartment of the tested cell types a condensation of chromatin, a ruffling of the nuclear envelope with loosening of condensed chromatin from the lamina, and an apparent loss of nucleolar fibrillar component which disappears in a background of diffuse granular material. In hypo-osmotic media, there is a marked decondensation of chromatin and a fragmentation of the granular material of the nucleolus. As far as the cytoplasmic compartment is concerned, the electron density of the cytosol is markedly increasing when going from hypo- to hyper-osmotic conditions and there is no vacuolization in hypo-osmotic media. In kidney cortex slices, application of hypo-osmotic shocks further results in a marked reduction of the extracellular space delimited by the infoldings of the tubular cells plasma membranes. These modifications are discussed in relation to the volume regulation process and the changes in ion concentration that occur in cells submitted to anisosmotic media.

The effect of cycloheximide on nuclear uH2A content

The effect of intraperitonal cycloheximide administration on acid-soluble rat liver chromatin proteins has been investigated by electrophoresis in acetic acid-urea polyacrylamide gels. A nonhistone protein, which migrates between oxidized histone H3 and histone H1 has been found to be increased in amount following cycloheximide treatment. This protein seems to be identical with semihistone protein H24 (uH2A). A possible relationship of uH2A to the inhibition of rRNA synthesis is discussed.